


In the Moment

by akire_yta



Category: Heroes - Fandom
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-18
Updated: 2013-08-18
Packaged: 2017-12-23 20:47:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 937
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/930933
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/akire_yta/pseuds/akire_yta
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Isaac/Peter: Love. Give me love of the romantic sort or the<br/>dirty, smutty type. Also, I would kill for Apocolypse!Fic.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In the Moment

**Author's Note:**

> pinch hit for the heroes-holidays, for exit15b.

The table started out life as a canvas frame, the taunt surface  
rippled and patched, like the city around them. Peter's plate had a  
hairline crack that ran from the subtle blue tracery around the edge  
right under the greyish-white squares of rations 'food' and out almost  
to the other side. Cracked, but holding. Peter knew how that felt.

Across from him, Isaac smiled tightly, a smudge of dirt or paint under  
his checkbone highlighting the pallor of his skin, the hollowness  
around his eyes. But the curve of the lips was so much like home that  
Peter felt his heart lurch again.

"Are you okay?" Peter felt a giggle escape his mouth at the inanity  
of the question, and Isaac dropped his head in agreement. Beyond his  
now habitual bandana, the curls were rioting, knotting, halfway to  
dreadlocks.

Peter remembered another time, a blissful moment he did not treasure  
enough. Isaac on white sheets (clean! safe!), his hair fanned out  
around his head like a halo. Careful of their ad-hoc table, he  
reached over and brushed light fingers over the tangles. Isaac leaned  
forward, pushing into Peter's hand like a cat. "You need to take  
better care of yourself," he murmured.

"I paint," Isaac said tonelessly, as if that was the whole of his  
world. Perhaps it was. He painted, eyes white, fingers moving and  
slowly swelling, as the others moved through the world and tried to  
match up the cartoonish images with the scenes of human devastation.

Isaac never left the aerie they had made for him, but he saw the world  
just the same. Peter often wondered if it was easier or harder to see  
the wreckage of the city down the end of a paintbrush rather than  
lying at your feet, but his curiousity was never enough to touch that  
place inside his mind where he could find out.

Hands wrapped around his wrists, fingers pressing into his pulse  
point. "Hey?" Peter took a deep breath and sat back down, twisting  
his arms in Isaac's grip so they could hold each others hands.  
Isaac's smile was soft. "You can finish saving the world tomorrow."  
Save the world. Once it was his mantra. Now, it was their private  
joke.

Save the world, no matter what world was left.

"Sit down Peter, and finish your protein."

"You sound like my mother," Peter shot back even as he sat down  
carefully, never letting go.

"I knew your family was dysfunctional, but if what we have reminds you  
of your mother, then you are seriously fucked up, you know that?"

Thinking of his mother didn't hurt. For once, he and Nathan had been  
in agreement, had organized a trip out of the city for her, for Heidi,  
for the boys. They were safe from this, at least.

Did they think that he and Nathan were dead? Were they grieving? Had  
they moved on with what life they could make?

The hand in his squeezed gently. "Hey, Pete. Come on, if this is a  
bad time, we can…"

"No." Peter took another deep breath and focused. "You went to a lot  
of effort, and we haven't had time to ourselves in forever." He made  
a small show of appreciatively taking the scene in, the small details  
that demonstrated love and caring. "So you just keep those beautiful  
eyes brown and in the here and now, and we'll be good."

Isaac looked unconvinced, but he nodded. "Well, I'd ask you how your  
day was, but since I painted that last week, it seems kind of  
pointless."

Peter latched onto the seed of normality. "Actually, you didn't paint  
the bit where Nathan got caught in an updraft and got tangled in  
someone's laundry. Fell four stories before he got it under control,  
and even then he was zipping about like Casper on acid before he got  
the damn sheet off his head…"

As he wove his story, he watched Isaac laugh, the pain and stress  
slowly melting away, leaving behind a man unburdened by his power, his  
gift, his curse. During the day, they both had their roles to play,  
seeing the future, making the choice, averting what dangers they  
could. But for tonight they could simply be in the moment.

Their laughter wound down, and Isaac withdrew just long enough to  
unseal the lid on one of the little bottles of clean water that the  
Red Cross occasionally tossed over No-Man's Land for the survivors.  
"I couldn't find any cups I would drink out of, so we can't really  
make a toast."

Peter wrapped his fingers around the bottle, weaving himself around  
and through Isaac's. "To us."

"To another day." He offered the bottle to Peter, then raised it to  
his own lips. Peter felt a stab of long-absent desire shoot through  
him as Isaac's throat moved and swallowed.

Peter reached out again, put the bottle down, and grasped Isaac's worn  
and paint-stained shirt. Muscles built lifting rubble, moving the  
dead and helping the survivors were now employed to haul Isaac half  
out of his seat and into a fierce kiss.

"Love you. Always."

Isaac nodded. "I know. Do you?"

Peter sat back down, his chest tight. "Hey, I'm here, right?" he  
joked, trying to ease the pressure on his heart, behind his eyes.

"What else do we need," Isaac replied, matching his tone even as he  
stood up and moved his little artist's stool over to him. "You, me, a  
bottle of water…"

"And you can't beat the view." Together, arms wrapped around each  
other, fingers woven together tightly, they watched the sun set the  
horizon on fire.


End file.
